I asked Jim Ross the likelihood that the region, at some point in 2014, will finish recovering the jobs it lost in the recession. Ross tracks the Capital Region as an labor analyst employed by the state.

"If current trends continue, it's a good bet we'll get back to where we were. You're not out of line at all to say that," Ross tells me.

Ross noted that the area's private sector topped its pre-recession peak more than a year ago. Today, the area has more private-sector jobs (351,000) than ever.

"And the government numbers have started to rise—not dramatically, but they're going up and they are not the drag they were before," Ross says.

There are caveats, of course, starting with the fact that we're only talking about raw numbers of jobs, not the quality of those jobs (i.e., a civil engineer versus a job in the fast-food industry).

Also, each spring, the state revises its jobs data using more complete information than what is immediately available during the monthly labor updates.

The most recent revision, in March, revealed that months earlier, the Capital Region's private sector had actually finished recovering the jobs lost during the recession.

"All we have to go on right now is what we have in front of us," Ross says. "That revision could send those numbers up or down."